Dance inside the funny farm
Disclaimer: Percy Jackson belongs to Rick Riordain. All discworld and associated stuff belong to Terry Prachett.
Fate eyed Blind Io warily. Blind Io briefly considered his hand. How he did this remains a mystery. "Three two's." said Blind Io, laying his cards down.
"Royal flush." said Fate, calmly claiming victory. Fate always wins. At least when people stick to the rules. And don't use those little butterflies. You know the ones. Stupid butterflies. "Anyone up for another game?" asked Fate, idly shuffling the cards. "A brisk game of hero's of might and magic?" None of the gods particularly enjoyed playing this game, at least not against fate. It worked simply. Each god or entity sends a hero to complete a quest. All the hero's get the same quest. The entity who's hero complete's the quest first, wins.
"I believe I shall take you up on your offer." said the Lady, walking into the room. The other gods smiled. Watching the lady and Fate face off was always entertaining.
"Of course." said Fate, giving her a sly grin. "Who have you chosen as your hero?"
"Rincewind the wizard." she said, taking out a coin that was pure and heavy. The soul of a pure hero's always was. Several of the gods started to realise this would be another legendary game. Rincewind, a failed magician who could barely fight, was not your typical hero. But somehow, incredibly, unfailingly he manages to turn the tables on his opponent an win. What Hero would Fate use to match him?
Fate smiled and took a coin out of his pocket. It was a pure crystal, tinged with black, and it had a wavy effect if you looked at it. Black and nothingness effortlessly entwined around each other. "I choose Percy Jackson." said Fate.
Meanwhile, in and next to Hades:
"IS THERE A REASON YOU ASKED TO SEE ME?" asked Death, grinning widely at Hades, who looked angrier than Death had ever seen him.
"Yes." said Hades. He cast an angry look at a translator who was looking petrified. Three skeletons held him and a fourth had an oddly transparent knife at his throat. "This, translator, was ordered, fifty years ago to decipher a particular prophecy handling the fate of the gods. It said that the next hero to be born of the Big three, as me and my brother are called, will either save or destroy the gods." Death was still grinning, but he didn't have much choice in the matter. "Now this, foolish mortal read it as "save or doom the gods of the roundworld." Today he discovered that it meant discworld."
"Please my lord, it was an honest mistake!" begged the translator. "I mean disc, round, it's like potato, patato or ." The man stopped as Hades lifted his finger.
"May I remind you that due to you I haven't gotten laid in fifty years." said Hades, and the translator saw over a hundred thousand possibilities for his death in Hades's eyes, each more painful than the last.
"VERY WELL." said Death. "I SHALL TAKE THE BOY."
"Good." said Hades. "Now lets talk about the truly important Cosmic matters." Hades clicked open a can of Coke. " Have you noticed that whenever someone eats something really weird they say it tastes like chicken? So theoretically, shouldn't someone who lives off cockroaches and stuff, think that chicken tastes like cockroaches?"
" I AM AFRAID I CANNOT EXCHANGE PLEASANTRIES." said Death. "I HAVE TO GO AND FETCH THIS PERCY JACKSON."
"Right." said Hades. "Don't want to disfigure the space time continuum. Or was that Cleaveland?"
"NO, I REMEMBER THE FUTURE. NOT CLEAVELAND." said Death.
Hades rose, the silken robes moving unwaveringly. "Ok. You go then. Stay alive out there."
Still grinning, Death left.Hades looked at the translator. "Your undying legs shall be kept in acid, while these very angry hell puppies teeth on you." said Hades glaring at the translator. "And of course, just for flourish, and to make this completely unbearable….. he snapped his fingers and three giant speakers sprung up from the ground. The words haunted the translator far more than the acid or the hell hound puppies. "Hey, Hey, you, you, I know that you like me," Hades later felt mercy and threw the speakers on top of the man.
In the classroom of one Percy Jackson……
Hmm. I 'm getting a feeling that all kinds of higher beings really, really, want to mess up my day. I was sitting in the steps of my new school, calmly listening to the sound of the bell screeching. I had three normal, ah wrong word, hmm, ordinary, nah, mortal, yeah mortal friends at this school, and I might actually miss this school. Most of the guys who would be bullies, were conveniently scared off when I "accidentally' turned physco and punched through a door. The school's main antagonistic idiot just coincidently happened to be at the other side.
"Hey, Percy." said Jack. He was eating a packet off nachos and had assorted liquorice scars across his arms. We should never have done that.
Kyle and Kurt both sat down next to me. Kurt and Jack were best friends since they were about six. Jack was a emo lovechild of the hippie era and Kurt a hard rocking raised to worship Ozzy Osbourne and Queen metal head, but they don't force they're stuff on anybody. Which was lucky for me. Now Kyle, believes that everything he knows may be theoretically wrong, so he asked both Kurt and Jack why they believed that they're music was superior. They both began long confusing arguments, and Kyle didn't decide on either, so Kurt claimed victory because Kyle was then a negative rocker which is a partial victory, and then Jack got all sad and Kurt, who was feeling bad offered to help him confuse Kyle even more, and Jack cheered up and Kyle then…. well, anyway, the important thing is, that in those five minutes we really got to know each other. Wait, what the fuck is Queen doing in, ah screw it.
"How was the English test?" asked Kyle, leaning backwards slightly. Stupid English test. The teacher claimed it was impossible that my dyslexia only kicked in on the words this and fcuk.
"Better than last year." I said. "No giant cannibals that want to eat me."
"Yeah, that would make it difficult to write a test." said Kyle. Damn straight.
"Giant cannibals?" said Kurt, who now looked confused. "I seriously need to check out that school you were at last year."
"I don't mean to alarm anyone, but a very scary apparition of the Grim Reaper suddenly appeared right in front of us." said Jack, continuing with his nachos.
"Nah, looks more like a wraith to me." said Kyle. Hmm. Whatever it is looks more like those liches from Warcraft 3, but with plain robes. Doesn't really strike the same amount of fear in me to be honest.
"I'M DEATH." said Death. "I HAVE COME FOR PERCY JACKSON. AND SOME OF THOSE NACHOS."
"No way! Go get your own nachos!" said Jack. "And your own Percy Jackson!"
'I APOLOGISE." said Death, emotionlessly. "DO YOU KNOW WHERE I CAN BUY SOME CURRY? I'M AFRAID THE INTER DIMENSIONAL TRAVEL HAS SOME ODD EFFECTS." Oh great. Now a Death from another dimension wants me too. Man, universal popularity is overrated.
"There is this nice place on third street." said Kurt. He was looking like one of those people who are waiting to wake up, only to be living the dream. Or the nightmare.
"THANK YOU. WELL PERCY, WE MUST LEAVE. THE FATE OF ALL THE GODS ON THE DISC WORLD ARE IN YOUR HANDS." said Death. Not….this….crap…..again.
"I've already got a world to save." I said standing up slowly. " I'm afraid I'm rather attached to this world." Man, my witty banter stinks today, but I'm facing Death. I wonder if he has a friend called certain death so I can face him too?
"THE PROPHECY WAS INCORRECTLY INTERPRETED. YOU HAVE TO SAVE THE GODS OF THE DISCWORLD. YOU HAVE TO SAVE THE DISCWORLD." said Death.
"Percy, are you Harry Potter?" asked Kyle. Hmm, guess the green eyes black, hair thing can throw you off.
"No I'm not." I fixed Death with my best stare. "And I'm not going with death. I'm not suicidal." Yeah, the quality is seriously dropping.
"I WASN'T GIVING YOU A CHOICE." Said Death. "I CANNOT LET YOU DOOM ALL THE INHABITANTS OF THE DISCWORLD SIMPLY BECAUSE YOU DON'T WANT TO COME WITH ME." He drew out his scythe. The blade clicked open and two passing zephyrs flew through the air, perfectly halved.
I took out my pen and opened it, and Riptide formed. I put the sword in my hands and adjusted my position. Man, camp half blood should really add scythes to the the curriculum. Scythes, swords, spears insurance salesman, paper and axes, but they just don't show you how to fight against someone with a scythe.
"I didn't know your pen can do that." said Kyle.
I stared into the face of Death. Death grinned. Though he didn't look too happy about it. Wait, that doesn't sound right. Suddenly Death lunged. I blocked the scythe and slashed down but then something happened. Last I remember I just fell over, completely passed out.
Death picked Percy's fallen body up. He looked at his friends. "THIRD STREET DID YOU SAY?" asked Death.
"Yeah, but." began Kurt. "Give us our friend back you, you, skeleton guy , reaper thing!"
"Oh now that's witty." said Jack sarcastically. "Wait don't you just call him anorexic? He's a fucking skeleton! Just look at him! Call him bone head or make a comment about not having the guts to face you but please"
Kyle stood up. "Uh guys, less talking, more saving our friend from, ah crap. He has a horse. now we stand no chance."
'We're fighting Death, what difference does a horse make?" asked Kurt.
"Well, the horse is really big and….stuff." said Kyle.
"NOW, BACK INTO OUTER SPACE." said Death, who somehow managed to already get the curry. He and his horse flew away.
"So, now we gotta rescue Percy." said Jack. He glared at Kurt. "This would've been over a lot quicker if you had just sparkled wittily, but no, we have to make lame ass comments."
"Arguing about that will get us nowhere." said Kyle. "We need Percy back. We need a plan. Or a space ship." He looked up at the sky, in the general direction that Death had flown.
"Where are we going to get a space ship? Or a teleporter?" asked Kurt. "Guys, I think we may be in a little over out heads here. " He shook his head. "But we can't abandon Percy."
"We need a rocket or something else that works over long distances." said Kyle. "Time for Occam's razor."
"Oh dear god." said Jack again. "The simplest solution. Let me guess, we rob Nasa?"
"Woah! That's way better than the plan I had!" said Kyle. "I thought we were going to have to contact aliens. But rob Nasa. Yeah, lets do that."
"I don't mean to sound less than supportive of our little plan but ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE!?!?" yelled Kurt.
"Hey, you sound like Death now!" said Kyle. The rest of the students, who were by now mostly used to this politely ignored the quartet that had been reduced to a trio. For now most unusually, the were silent. Then Kurt spoke up.
"Okay then. We rob Nasa, or just go there and find out if they have something that can get Percy back from this discworld." said Kurt.
"Yeah. Tell Death that this time, it's personal." said Jack darkly.
"We didn't really face death." said Kyle. "We were more like, background noises."
"Wait, wouldn't the most logical approach be to first check at the place on third street to see if Death is still there?" asked Kurt. The others stared at him incredulously. "Okay, okay we rob Nasa." Alas, he already had the stupid curry.
Little did the brave warriors of right and uh, other stuff know it, but high above them, Percy's dad was watching them. "Okay, these idiots are going to need my help." said Poseidon grimly. "But first, a snack. Hmmmm.nachos."
Between the dimensions of all reality…..
Okay, I had thought learning that the gods still existed would be the strangest thing that ever happened to me. But in some weird way, I always knew they were there. This…this I really didn't see coming. "So, you're Death's horse." I said. "Uh, had any good apocolapyses lately?" The Horse looked at me coldly, and I realised I was being ignored. Or maybe because my dad didn't invent these horses, I couldn't talk to them.
"WELCOME TO THE DISCWORLD." said Death suddenly. "WELL, GO ON THEN. SAVE THE GODS AND ALL THAT. BYE!" Oh man. Fate had really dealt me a crap hand this time.
"No I didn't." said a middle aged guy, smiling at me.
"Who are you?" I asked, twirling my pen between my fingers.
"I'm Fate." said Fate. 'And I have a proposition form you."
"You're Fate?" I asked, lifting one eye brow , and tilting my head slightly to give that questioning effect. Yay. "So you're basically responsible for all the crap that's ever happened to me?"
"Yes." said Fate. "But I'm also responsible for every good thing that has ever happened to you. People often forget that."
"Aren't you karma then?" I asked.
"No. Karma realised that so many people hated him and were yelling "stupid Karma!" and all that, that he got confused, figured he and or she must be bad, and destroyed itself." said Fate. "People don't realise it, but judging someone is not to be done the wisest of all, yet it is always done by the foolishest of mortals."
"So, I guess you're the really wise guy who passes judgement?" I asked. Hah! I'm offending him by using his won words! Therefore, he can't incinerate me! Yay!
" No. Only the Creator can safely pass judgement, and he will only to so at the very end of time." He looked at me coldly, the black eyes looking like the perpetual abyss. " What people don't realise is that beginnings and endings are humans concepts. There are no such things." Huh. Well, this conversation does fell never ending, I think I'll just agree and hope he can't find me.
"Okay. I'll do it." I said. "Is your left hand or your right hand the cold hand of fate?" I asked extending my right hand. Smiling evilly, fate grasped my hand, and I felt something happen, and I knew there was no getting out of this.